


the cold light of dawn

by mstigergun



Series: Inglorious [3]
Category: Dragon Age - All Media Types, Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-16
Updated: 2015-12-16
Packaged: 2018-05-07 00:28:58
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,126
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5436662
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mstigergun/pseuds/mstigergun
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Leonid always means to be back in his own bed -- by <i>himself</i> -- before the sun comes up. But aspiration and reality turn out to be very different things, particularly when he always seems to end up kissing a rather lovely, and thus inherently irritating, ex-Templar.</p>
            </blockquote>





	the cold light of dawn

**Author's Note:**

  * For [delphox](https://archiveofourown.org/users/delphox/gifts).



> Prompted by [weyrbound](http://weyrbound.tumblr.com) for 'a slow kiss' and this lovely and doomed relationship (that is later salvaged as friendship, but _still_. Oh, what could have been!). Originally posted on [Tumblr](http://mstigergun.tumblr.com/post/132709165578/12-sachaleonid-because-i-am-a-sucker-for-their).
> 
> Set before "Leonid's No Good Day."

He meant to be back in his bed before the sky started to soften above the sharp-edged Frostbacks. It’s what he  _told_  Sacha; it was their  _arrangement_ , if Leonid could be convinced that what they had – what they were  _doing_  – was consistent enough to even merit such a vague descriptor, which he likely  _could not_.

No, really, it was Sacha’s fault. If he’d been reasonable about the entire thing – if he’d only understood the  _rules_ , which Leonid had in place for very good reasons indeed – and accepted that his time in Leonid’s bed was necessarily limited to the time in which they were  _fucking_ , then Leonid would have been in bed and by himself before the moon started to dip below the range of peaks. Before the other side of the broad, chill sky grew a soft, intimate gray that made Leonid cold to even look at.

But, instead, Sacha had been rather  _hurt_  about the whole thing and then insisted, the next time Leonid found himself pressing hard against Sacha outside of the tavern, flushed and hot despite the blighted frigid weather, that they retreat instead to Sacha’s quarters.

“But  _why_ ,” Leonid had asked, squinting up at Sacha in the dark. “Mine are closer. Admittedly not terribly  _tidy_ , but…” He left the thought unfinished, because he’d had too much ale to finish it in a terribly coherent way.

Sacha had sighed then, an unusually irritated sound. “If you  _must_  sleep alone,” he said, “We can go to my quarters. It is too cold for me to be wandering Haven half in the nude.”

Which was fine, particularly because it meant that Sacha would be  _entirely_  in the nude in his quarters, which was always a victory in Leonid’s books. Indeed, it  _is_  fine, this little arrangement of theirs. Leonid can be cold for the time it takes from him to walk from Sacha’s quarters all the way to his own, especially if it means his bed is empty when he gets back and he’s well-sated.

That his bed is also rather  _cold_  on the other end of that walk is –

Well. Inconsequential. Nothing a finger or two of the bourbon he keeps tucked in the top drawer of his wobbly dresser won’t fix.

In any case, it’s not the fucking in Sacha’s bed – or against the wall or on his letter desk or on the floor  _next_  to the bed because they hadn’t quite made it all the way there – that’s particularly the problem. Rather, it’s the –

Leonid doesn’t actually know how to describe it. Whatever this subtle  _magic_  is that Sacha’s working to somehow keep him there later and later, or, rather, the crux of it is that he’s there  _earlier and earlier_.

He actually asks, because Leonid has entirely run out of possible explanations or probable causes. “What,” he murmurs against Sacha’s generous mouth, “are you  _doing_  to me?”

Sacha pulls back, his head tilting to one side. “I am… kissing you.” A pause, then his forehead creases in a concern so immediate and  _genuine_  that it makes Leonid’s head spin. “Is it alright? Do you need me to stop?”

“Of course it’s  _alright_ , Sacha,” says Leonid, waspish, head tipping back against the wall. “And of course I’d noticed we were  _kissing_. That’s not at all what I mean.” His shoulders are a lax line, arms folded around Sacha’s neck. In the hearth, the fire crackles, steady and certain, an efficient heat that renders the whole place –

Cozy, almost.

Leonid feels his eyebrows pull together, his lips turn downward. “I shouldn’t still  _be_  here,” he supplies. Which should be explanation enough.

“You may stay as long as you would like,” Sacha says, his voice a rumble Leonid can feel from the tips of his fingers, which brush against the soft skin of Sacha’s dark neck, to the tight coil of heat and lax desire still living in his gut.

“It’s  _stupid_ ,” Leonid insists, though the thin irritation has long since left his tone. Even that Sacha  _laughs_  at his comment does nothing to change the lazy heat unfurling beneath his skin. Instead, he feels only like that fire burns in his marrow, his lips swollen, his eyes glassy. He’d been on his way out the door when –

 _Surely_ , he’d thought, as Sacha stood at his side, bare and warm and  _foolishly_  handsome,  _one kiss can’t hurt_. Because Sacha is a great number of things, and  _particularly talented with his mouth_  is most certainly one of them.

And then Leonid had ended up folded against Sacha, making the most  _inane_  little sounds which would seem almost  _contented_  if they didn’t both know better. If they didn’t both entirely understand that those ridiculous little noises escaping his throat were –

Related to the sex. A hangover, of sorts. Distant cousins to the indecent sounds he’d been making earlier.

He huffs out a breathy laugh.  _Distant cousins_. His fingers stretch to touch the few strands of hair that have escaped the knot tied at the back of Sacha’s head; they’re soft and  _forbidden_ , and so Leonid thinks they’re rather wonderful.

“You’re  _ridiculous_ ,” Leonid murmurs, his stare again half-lidded, reduced to a warm familiarity that is entirely new. The easy smile on his own face, the steady gentless in Sacha’s dark eyes.

“You,” Sacha says, his words quiet, made dawn-quiet in these early morning hours, “are exquisite.”

Leonid pulls himself closer again, tightening his arms and leaning his body against Sacha’s. Sacha’s mouth is warm against his, hands a familiar weight against the small of Leonid’s back, against the planes of his shoulder. Again, a quiet sound escapes Leonid’s throat as Sacha’s lips slide against his, one hand reaching to press thoughtful fingers to the skin just beneath the line of Leonid’s jaw –

“I  _do_  need to go,” Leonid says, leaning back again.

“If you must.” As quiet and slow as these early hours.

Leonid smiles, softer than he means to, his arms dropping away. He slides out from beneath Sacha’s palms, stopping only long enough to tug on his boots before he slips out the door.

He doesn’t look back, instead cutting across Haven as the sky above pales to a downy gray. Though the air is cold enough to snap at his exposed skin, to make his nose run even as he makes the short walk, hands shoved into his pockets, the sky above feels –

Hushed, he thinks. Warm, in its own way.

Which is when he realizes he has a problem, really.

But, Leonid thinks distantly as he shoulders his way into his own chilly quarters, that’s something to fret about another day. For now, he has a long drink of bourbon waiting and his empty bed. Just as he likes it.

Just like this.


End file.
